Dear Buddies, Pombes, and Yeastnetters,
In one of Mike Cherry's new sequence listings I noticed several ARSs
(autonomously replicating sequences) were submitted along with "replication
origin" in the keyword listing. Several of these sequences are from the HML
region of chromosome III of cerevisiae. They have ARS activity in the
context of a plasmid (by definition an ARS is a plasmid replication origin)
but are clearly not replication origins in their normal context in the
chromosome (see D. Dubey, et al. in MCB 11:5346-55, 1992). In fact, Carol
Newlon and coworkers have shown that only 5 out of 14 ARSs cloned from the
left 200 kb of chromosome III actually function in chromosomal replication.
My question for the yeast network is: Should ARSs be allowed the loose
title of "replication origin" or should the term be reserved for the
sequences that serve to replicate the chromosome?
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Charles A. Miller
Room 374 J.B. Johnston Bldg. (CBR)
Dept. Environmental Heath Sciences
Tulane University Medical Center
1501 Canal St. Box SL29
New Orleans, LA. 70112
Ph. 504-585-6942 Fax 504-585-6939
rellim at mailhost.tcs.tulane.edu
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